Platonic friendships between men and women...

    So I have been asking for ideas with the blog about things friends and relationships and this topic was one of them. So I am going to tell you how I view it, the issues it can cause and some other fun facts.


    Now I am a woman. That is obvious if you have seen my picture. Or if you know me in person. Well growing up and even now I will admit I do NOT have many gal friends and the reason why is because they are drama. Now don't get me wrong. The few that I do have and keep close are far from that, but there is a reason. Girls are like guys, but in their own ways....Okay follow me for a second (totally heard my bro in-law's voice there for a second lol)...girls always have to look good. ALWAYS!!! It is crazy. Oh you don't have this...oh then you aren't good enough. Or you aren't this weight or this small. Oh you don't have tons of money. Or maybe they are fighting over guys. Believe it or not it happens and it is stupid! No offense. 

   Girls are just as bad as guys in areas. Like when they compete in a race or something. Now mind you I do love a good round of Mario games with the family and the fact i know when we play it is all fun in games makes it even more fun, but when you are around ones who will put you down along the way well...you just wanna get away from those. 

    Competitions are fun, but only if everyone keeps it fun. Some can just get down and dirty and not care who they tear down along the way. Yeah those are people you also don't want to be around. 

   Now why do I get along with guys better?!?!?! It is easy...yes some can flirt, but it is never taken to heart since I have been with Sir. I am a natural flirt. I don't mean to though if it is towards others. In my eyes it was just always me being nice. If I can see things going too far I stop them as soon as I notice something. 

   If you find the right guys though you can talk to them about anything. It is just like having a best girlfriend, but less drama. Now I have had friends that just saw it as me somehow being slutty, but that isn't it at all. In fact my "sluty" number is low. Lower than a lot of you readers and i am okay with that. Only two people I know are lower than me, but that is because they haven't been with anyone yet. I respect that. I am okay with my number though. Hint...I married the ones I have slept with. So if I have divorced one and am in a second marriage then....well there ya have it (oh shoot I hear Ma in my head now too lol) Honestly she is a good one. So that's okay. ALL my in-laws are amazing. They are thee nicest family I have ever met. I get to be me. It is like I am free around them. I can be me and not worry about being judged. 

   Back to the topic though...
I feel when I am around guy friends I am respected more. They are also guys who I know would have my back in a heartbeat if anything ever happened to me. I have more support now in these last few years than ever before. I know I can count on them. Most my friends are also military...Why??? Simple I feel safer around them than civilians. I do have a few civilian friends though. Due to my past though they all know how low my trust is and how high that was is to get over and only a few have gotten over it. I try to keep them close though.

   Now being friends with the opposite sex can get messy if there is no trust between the two of you. A lot of times that is exactly the issue. Maybe they gave you a good reason not to trust them though. Now I know with Dum-Dum he has friends of the opposite sex and since he cheated I didn't trust him. I still don't trust him though. Once one cheats ALL the trust is dead and gone. 

   Sir works with people so I kinda had to let my trust lead the way there. It is a great thing that trust is one of the first things we built while in different states. When I get iffy I ask Sir what he would do if he was in certain situations. He told me he would excuse himself, call boss man and leave the job site till someone else was to be there with him so he could eventually still finish the job. He is well aware of why I have trust issues, but he has no problem assuring me that he would never cheat on me and in the 9+ years we have been together he has never cheated on me. Not even once. I love how we can talk about anything though.

   I may be a married woman, but Sir knows he can trust me. Which is why he trusts me around other guys. Now if the guy messes up and makes a wrong move I will remind them that it isn't okay. If they mess up they are gone. It is just that simple. I have to much love and respect to mess anything up with Sir.  

   This is definitely a subject that will make you think hard and really look at what is going on. If you are NOT comfortable with friends of the opposite sex then you two need to really sit down and talk.



Now we are going to do a guys point of view. 


    Friends of the opposite sex. As a moderately successful businessman, I find it important to be able to assess and realize what somebody is truly looking for, faster than most normally would. Lots of people in this world will tell you that they want what is best for you however they have their eye on what is in your pants and no, I'm not talking about your sex organ, this time I'm talking about your money.

Me personally, I find it much easier and more rewarding to have female friends, females are genuinely happy for you when you succeed, they are not in competition with you and the better you do, the happier they genuinely are for you. Men always find themselves in competition, look at the age-old debate of "mine is bigger than yours" that's right, to a good majority of men out there size is all that truly matters, however any REAL woman will tell you, it's the way you work the controls that truly matters. But again, women do not see you as competition. When you do well for yourself, they see you as being successful and accomplishing your goals where as a good majority of men, will find a way to belittle and one-up you. This is where things always get tricky. While in a monogamous relationship and having friends of the opposite sex, there is always the possibility of somebody getting jealous. I personally do not deal with jealousy nor do I choose to function with jealous people and here's why. The best friend I've ever had in the world happened to be a very attractive 23 year-old female. Me being 33 myself, there is a decent offset in age and where mainstream media will tell you that an older gentleman getting with a younger female is THE DREAM, that could not be farther from the truth. See this particular friend was not only young, not only attractive, but focused, had her head in the game, screwed on quite tightly if I might add. She was career-oriented and driven, she did not like anything unless it was new and shiny so she worked hard for it. Given the circles that we both ran in, and my uncanny ability to pick up and travel anywhere I wanted at the drop of a dime, we spent quite a bit of time together. Her boyfriend at the time was a very very good friend of mine and there was nothing I wouldn't do for that man, as such he often pawned her off on me, had me take her to run errands even as simple as going to the bank or grabbing us all something to eat for the evening. We all traveled cross-country together, we had an absolute blast, I was her big brother so to speak and I protected her well-being, but that became intimidating to some people. While we are all our own biggest critic, I am somewhat of a handsome person and have a lot more to offer in not only the looks and financial department, but I also believe in Traditional Values and being a gentleman at all times in which this particular guy certainly does not. I would open doors for her and certainly make sure that if it were raining she had access to my umbrella as opposed to myself, that was my "little sister" so of course I made sure her interests were protected before my own. Many occasions we were out at a bar or a dancehall and some guy would slide his way in close to her and start talking to her from something as simple as a tattoo or blatantly hitting on her to which my default response was standing between them and wrapping my arm around her to see if she was ready to go. It had always been seemingly well-received that I was looking out for her and acting as her protector because I treated her as if she were my own as the ultimate sign of loyalty to my friend whom she was dating. As my best friend we were in contact constantly, I spoke to her daily, sometimes we would be on the phone during her lunch break, other times a simple hello in the morning and a good night later that evening. But there was not any given length of time where we were not in contact with each other, when their relationship fell on hard times it was I she came to for comfort and advice. Unfortunately that was the beginning of the end for our friendship as the jealousy started to rain down like a category 5 hurricane.

You see when you deal with a man who is insecure in his own masculinity, you will always find the potential for jealousy, to be jealous is to be afraid that somebody is going to take something from you, and even though my intention was never to take anything from him, if anything were to have been taken it was because of the fact that he pushed us together with his own laziness and unwillingness to do anything for himself, he is the reason we became Inseparable, he is the reason we became best friends and I would have had it no other way. While she was my very best friend and is now no more than a stranger with memories, I would turn around and be her friend all over again, in an absolute heartbeat before ever seeking comfort in someone of the same sex. Through the rise and fall of my success never once did she try to get in my pocket, never once did she ask for free products even though she was very much involved in the type of products I offered. when I had received news of a large deal closing and that deposit hit my account, I had offered to pay for dinner as a celebratory gesture of my own success to which she politely declined and actually ended up covering the bill in its entirety. When I did well we celebrated together, and when things looked bleak, she was there to tell me to keep my head up because things were going to get better. Did I love that girl, absolutely, but did that mean I had a romantic interest in her or we had to sleep together? Absolutely not. And while I do very much miss my best friend as I have yet to find anybody else who pales in comparison, it is one of the risks we certainly take when having friends of the opposite sex..

   So in the end when it comes to being friends with the opposite sex it all comes down to one thing...Do you truly trust them?